#chief engineer experience

[chiefengineerlog]

My CII rating dropped from C to D. The technical director asked me a simple question: "What in your SEEMP Part III corrective action plan explains why, and what have you actually implemented from it?" I had the document open in front of me. I had signed it. I could not answer the question in any meaningful way. For two years, I treated SEEMP Part III exactly like every other document that shows up because a regulation requires it. Something to file. Something to have onboard for the auditor. Something my Second Engineer updated once a year, and I signed without reading closely. That meeting exposed what I actually knew, which was almost nothing. After the meeting, I went back and read the entire document line by line for what I'm embarrassed to admit was the first time. What I found explained exactly why the rating dropped, and none of it was a mystery. The speed optimization strategy was calculated for deep-sea passages. Our charterers had shifted us to shorter coastal legs eighteen months earlier. The hull cleaning interval was based on a coating system that had been replaced at the last drydock. Nobody updated the document. The trim tables assumed cargo loading patterns that no longer matched how we were actually operating. None of this was fraud. The document had simply gone stale the moment our operating reality changed, and nobody, including me, treated it as something that needed to stay current. I wrote the full story at chiefengineerlog.com — what I found, why this happens fleet-wide, and what I changed on every vessel since. Read it at chiefengineerlog.com — link in comments. Subscribe for real field stories, not textbook theory. #SEEMP #CIIRating #MaritimeDecarbonization #IMOCompliance #ChiefEngineer #chiefengineerlog

Why SEEMP Part III Is More Than a Compliance Document

[chiefengineerlog]

I want to tell you about the bunker delivery that taught me never to sign a delivery note based on a barge's numbers alone. The barge's flow meter showed 380.4 metric tons delivered. Their delivery note said the same number. Everything matched. Which felt like confirmation. It wasn't. It was two numbers generated by the same party agreeing with each other. My own sounding, before and after, with proper temperature correction, told a different story. My tanks showed a receipt of approximately 351 metric tons. A shortfall of nearly 30 metric tons. At the fuel prices back then, that gap was worth roughly eighteen thousand dollars. Here's what I want to be honest about: this wasn't actually my first shortage. There had been a smaller one, years earlier. And the first time, I did what almost every engineer does the first time: I assumed I had made the error. I second-guessed my own sounding. I wondered if the tank tables were off. I convinced myself the barge's numbers were probably right. I signed the note. Not because I believed it. Because I didn't yet trust my own verification enough to challenge a barge operator who does this daily. It took the second, much larger shortage to stop assuming I was the one making the mistake. I wrote the full story at chiefengineerlog.com — what actually creates a 30-ton gap, the conversation on the manifold, and what I do differently on every delivery since. Read it at chiefengineerlog.com — link in comments. Subscribe for real field stories, not textbook theory. #BunkerDelivery #MarineFuel #ChiefEngineer #MarineEngineering #FuelManagement #chiefengineerlog

The Bunker Delivery Note That Didn't Match the Tank